1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a portable terminal, a shop-front terminal, a communication system and a communication method and, in particular, to a portable terminal, a shop-front terminal, a communication system and a communication method with which a user can send service request information such as an image from the portable terminal to the shop terminal and receive a service such as a print service.
2. Description of the Related Art
Conventionally, there is known a print system with which a user brings an exposed negative film or the like, on which images are photographed with a silver salt camera, to a processing laboratory and a DP reception shop and then visits there to receive the images after processing such as the printing is completed.
In addition, in an electronic camera such as an electronic still camera, a captured image is recorded in a recording medium for image data such as a floppy disk and an LSI card. If an image captured with this electronic camera is printed by a printing device of a shop-front installed type or a communication apparatus provided with a printing device, a user directly operates the printer or the like of a shop-front installed type to execute printing. In this case, the user inserts the recording medium in the printer in accordance with an instruction on its display screen or the like and causes the printer to read the image data, thereby executing printing.
In addition, as another method, the user performs work such as transferring an image captured with an electronic camera to another communication device via a cellular phone.
However, when a method of inserting a recording medium in the conventional printer of a shop-front installed type (hereinafter abbreviated and referred to as shop-front terminal) to transfer image data is used, the shop-front terminal tends to suffer from a mischievous act such as stuffing a foreign body such as gum into an inserting portion for a recording medium of the shop-front terminal, whereby an inconvenience is caused in that the shop-front terminal becomes inoperable.
In addition, with the method of sending image data to another communication device via a cellular phone, since a current information transfer rate of a cellular phone is low relative to an amount of image data, an inconvenience is caused in that transfer of image data takes long and communication costs increase.